John Lynch
In the late 1970's Lynch lost his eye by his own free will when he tore it from his skull during a fight with some sort of mutated being in a top secret military facility in Leningrad. Shortly afterwards, his wife left him and took their son with her. He stayed in government service, becoming a Director of Operations at I.O., with one his his major motivations being the search for his missing son. But when the kids of Gen¹³ were recruited without his consent and exposed to experiments which had turned many members of Gen 12 insane, he helped Gen¹³ to escape and left I.O. One of Gen¹³'s members was his own son, Burnout, from whom he had been separated years before. He stayed with Gen¹³ in his house in La Jolla, San Diego, acting as their mentor until I.O. raided the house. The team kept moving around and Lynch started to display paranoid behaviour. When several Gen¹³ members were taken into the future, Caitlin Fairchild encountered a future version of John Lynch, an insane and dangerous man. Returning to the present, Fairchild saw Lynch slowly becoming the man she had seen in the future, causing a rift between Lynch and the team. This rift finally became so strong that Lynch left the team and Alex Fairchild, Caitlin's father and another Team 7-member, took over as their mentor. Alex died shortly afterwards and Lynch returned. Caitlin finally told Lynch about his future version, but added that recent events had shown her that he was a different man than the man she encountered in the future. Tao and Earl Shortly afterwards the villain Tao kidnapped Lynch and took his place. Lynch meanwhile was made to think that he was an overweight man named Earl, living a normal life. Gen¹³ defeated TAO, while Lynch slowly recovered his memories and lost the extra weight. Gen¹³ searched for him without any success. Lynch contacted them, telling them that he was planning on living a normal life as Earl for a while together with the nurse who had been taking care of him during these past few months. (see discussion page) In reality, Lynch had become convinced that he was the only one who could stop the enigmatic Tao. He returned to I.O. and regained his post as a Director of Operations. It was during that time that he placed his former star pupil, Holden Carver, undercover in TAO's syndicate. Several months later, the Divine Right incident led US government to shut down International Operations. Lynch agreed to work for the Department of Paranormal Science Investigations (PSI). He maintained regular contact with Holden Carver. The new IO In the fall of 2002, Lynch decided to extract Carver, feeling that placing him under cover was a mistake. He recruited Cole Cash, his former Team 7 teammate, to help him. The plan went awry when Lynch got shot through the head by a mind-controlled Cash. Although his Gen-Factor saved his life, he remained in coma for over a year. Late 2003, he emerged from coma. Shortly afterwards, the Authority took over United States. He persuaded his new superiors to allow him to recreate I.O., this time as Internal Operations, a security agency dedicated to hunting down TAO and the members of the Syndicate. Today, John Lynch continues to head I.O, with Marc Slayton acting as his second-in-command. It is unknown whether he still maintains contact with Gen¹³. Worldstorm Seen in the new Gen13 title, John Lynch appears to be a simple, if high-ranking, soldier for IO, attached to the Tabula Rasa project, which is responsible for creating IO's supersoldiers (and seemingly selling some to private bidders). Lynch is a hunter, tasked with making sure that no experiments escape; however, he failed with the Gen13 team, who managed to reach the facility's experimental teleporter in time. It is interesting to note that in this new universe, Lynch's missing eye is a result of his trying to stop Gen13's escape - Rainmaker fried it with her lightning. | Powers = Although many would point to Lynch's tactical mind and leadership as his greatest powers, his exposure to the Gen Factor had endowed him with super-human abilities. He considered these powers a closely guarded secret and rarely used them, as each use caused him to weaken considerably. His Gen-Factor given powers were primarily strong telekinetic powers, also known as the Mojo or the Rush among Team 7-members. His telekinesis is stronger when other Team 7-members link with him, increasing its strength almost exponentially. The downside to these powers was that they were nearly impossible to control. Especially Lynch had this problem; using his telekinesis could unleash incredible amounts of raw energy, obliterating friends and foe alike and Lynch often didn't dare to use it. Using the powers also put a terrible strain on Lynch himself; trying to keep them under control would often cause blood vessels to rupture and he would weaken. Prolonged use would threaten his sanity and outside forces (like I.O. telepath Alicia Turner) were needed to calm him down and make him regain control. After joining Department PSI, Lynch underwent treatments to increase his powers and his control is now far better, though he still is temporarily weakened after each use. He now is capable of mentally controlling people, erasing memories and offering them protection against other telepaths or other forms of mind-control. When using his powers, his eyes turns green. Lynch also has a cybernetic eye, replacing the eye he once lost. | Abilities = | Strength = | Weaknesses = | Equipment = | Transportation = | Weapons = | Notes = | Trivia = *In the Gen¹³ animated movie, Lynch's voice was provided by John de Lancie. *John Lynch is an homage to Nick Fury, the one-eyed head of S.H.I.E.L.D. *Lynch is a fan of opera and especially enjoys the works of Luciano Pavarotti. | Links = }} Category:Gen¹³ members